A tarot-related site rates Rhode Island home to the spookiest city in America, so contemplate that while snacking on your Halloween treats. You can follow me through the week on Bluesky, threads and X. Here we go.
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1. STORY OF THE WEEK: The impending end of Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Programs (SNAP) for millions of Americans this weekend has been squelched for now due to a court ruling in Providence. Americans tend to like the abstract notion of cutting the size and scope of government -- and President Trump’s administration has doubled down on this by trying to use the federal shutdown as a way to dismiss thousands more workers. But the idea of depriving food assistance for needy people in the run-up to Thanksgiving is not a good look, particularly when an estimated 13.5% of Americans are already dealing with a lack of sufficient food. According to Democratic Gov. Dan McKee’s office, SNAP delivers about $29 million in crucial food assistance each month to about 145,000 Rhode Islanders. The state can’t make up that amount, McKee said in a release, and he put the onus on the White House to address the situation. “President Trump’s failure to act is cruel and unacceptable,” McKee said this week. “I’m continuing to call on the president to use all available options to cover November benefits.” Across the partisan divide, U.S. Sen. Josh Hawley, a conservative Missouri Republican, is sponsoring a bill to keep SNAP funded. This shows how pressure is growing to end the shutdown, even as Democrats and Republicans continue to blame each other for the stalemate. If Democrats win in elections for governor on Tuesday in New Jersey and Virginia, that could speed a deal. For low-income individuals who rely on food assistance, a resolution can’t come soon enough. “What are they thinking?” Rhonda Hill, a homeless woman who said she lives in her truck, told Ocean State Media’s Isabella Jibilian this week. “We need food.”
2. HEALTH CARE CRISIS: The fate of Roger Williams Medical Center and Our Lady of Fatima Hospital has been a slow-motion train wreck. Critics of Prospect Medical Holdings began expressing fears four years ago that the hospitals could go bankrupt. In 2021, RI officials approved an ownership change at Prospect despite a warning about the company’s financial condition. Prospect filed for bankruptcy in January. It had already agreed to sell RIMC and Fatima to the Centurion Foundation, but there were serious questions about Centurion’s financing plan and it hasn’t yet been able to close the deal. Now, due to the delay, Prospect wants to pull the plug on the whole thing by shutting the hospitals or turning them over to the state. Attorney General Peter Neronha is prepared to fight it out in Bankruptcy Court in Texas, and Centurion holds out hope of completing its financing by some time in December. A key sticking point is $6 million in residual funds, controlled by a local foundation, dating back to when Prospect acquired the local hospitals in 2014.
3. CAMPAIGN CASH: Gov. Dan McKee’s campaign said it now has more than $1 million on hand, with more than $290,000 coming in in the previous quarter -- surpassing where he was at this point four years ago. “Rhode Islanders are making it clear: they want a governor who stands up to Trump and fights for working families – not a corporate insider like Helena Foulkes who is bankrolled by out-of-state interests,” campaign spokeswoman Christina Freundlich said in a statement …. Foulkes, meanwhile, reported having close to $2.5 million on hand, based on a Q3 haul of $534,277. Via spokesman Jon Romano, her campaign said, “Rhode Islanders are contributing to Helena’s campaign because they’re hungry for new leadership. With this third consecutive strong fundraising period in 2025, she continues to amass the resources needed to win this campaign and give Rhode Islanders the governor they deserve.”
4. MELLOR’S MOVE: It caught our attention when the NRCC, the campaign arm for congressional Republicans, recently went on the attack against Democratic U.S. Rep. Seth Magaziner -- particularly since he didn’t face a clear opponent at the time. Word soon bubbled up that an associate of Middletown native Michael Flynn, an avatar of Christian nationalism, was planning a run and the ProJo’s Kathy Gregg nailed down the story earlier this week. As she reported, Woonsocket native Victor Mellor, a longtime Florida businessman, has rented a home in Warwick and said he’s “likely” to challenge Magaziner next year as a Republican. Mellor owns “The Hollow,” dubbed “Florida’s playground for the far-right,” and he told Gregg that he made it inside the Capitol on Jan. 6. Magaziner responded quickly with a fundraising email citing what it called urgent news: “This is not a drill. A wealthy far-right extremist is running against me for Congress. Vic Mellor is connected to some of the most extreme and deep-pocketed people in far-right politics.” If Mellor follows through on his plan to run, it could set the stage for Magaziner’s biggest campaign battle since he beat Republican Allan Fung to win the CD2 seat in 2022. Mellor didn’t respond to an interview request from Ocean State Media. He told the ProJo that he can spend whatever it takes to win and bring along other candidates who want to side with him against “the socialist wing of the Democratic Party.” However, it remains unclear whether the Rhode Island GOP will embrace Mellor and whether his profile would benefit or harm the party’s efforts. On X, Gary Sasse, who served in the administration of Don Carcieri -- the last Republican to win a race for governor in Rhode Island (in 2006) -- said Mellor’s candidacy “could be very problematic for the Republican ticket in RI. RIGOP can do better.”
5. MAMDANIMANIA: Being an unapologetic socialist did nothing to slow the rise of NYC mayoral favorite Zohran Mamdani, who has emerged as the most prominent Democratic insurgent of Donald Trump’s second term and whose candidacy poses some key questions for the future of the party. Astead Herndon’s recent New York Times Magaziner cover story reported how Mamdani is reaching out in an attempt to assuage business/establishment concerns about his leftist profile. Regardless of one’s view of Mamdani, his ability to motivate new voters and his campaign’s skillful messaging via TikTok stand on their own strength. So is Providence Mayor Brett Smiley taking any notes from the man who could be the next mayor of New York City? “One of the things we’re seeing in New York right now is a real concern around affordability,” Smiley told me on this week’s edition of One on One, “and a candidate that rose to the occasion with solutions or ideas on how to address that. And so I think any of us [who] lose touch with our constituents and their most pressing concerns do so at our own peril. And that’s certainly a lesson for me. And for anybody thinking about running for public office.”
RELATED ….
*** Watch One on One on Ocean State Media TV (formerly Rhode Island PBS) at 7:30 tonight or 10:30 am Sunday. Some other highlights include whether Mayor Smiley favors remaking the ‘Scappalachian Trail’ along Allens Avenue as a residential area, whether he has an alternative to rent control, and a few questions about Israel.
***Providence-based podcast host and lefty activist Daniel Denvir tells Andrew Marantz of The New Yorker that Mamdani has Obama’s charisma with better politics and that Mamdani’s navigating some of the tough issues of power in Gotham will be a form of “the left growing up.”
*** Mayor Smiley’s top rival next year, state Rep. David Morales, an avid wrestling fan, tells my colleague David Wright that in 2025, there may be a bit too much overlap between wrestling and politics: “The president is a perfect example of kayfabe. Despite the fact that his ideas have put more stress on working people within our economy, he’s maintaining the kayfabe that his ideas are actually solutions.”
6. THE POLITICS OF HOUSING I: A housing progress report unveiled this week by Mayor Smiley does double-duty for the incumbent mayor. For starters, it shows how Providence is gaining ground on one of the state’s most difficult issues, moving further and faster on a per capita basis, Smiley said, than any other Rhode Island community. The mayor highlighted plans to use a new public-private partnership to build 76 affordable homes on a vacant downtown lot, and how close to a thousand units have been added over the last year. And while the need for additional housing remains vast, Smiley’s approach offers at least part of an answer to Rep. Morales’ Mamdaniesque critique on affordability.
7. THE POLITICS OF HOUSING II: House Speaker Joe Shekarchi has championed the cause of housing, so it was a bit curious for his name not to appear in a Realtor.com story headlined, “Rhode Island is Failing in Affordability and Homebuilding: Can Governor McKee Fix It?” Shekarchi is nonetheless slated to take part in a panel next Thursday, Nov. 6, during an inaugural housing summit hosted in Washington, D.C., by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce in association with the National Association of Home Builders. The panel in which Shekarchi is participating is called “Blueprints for Success.”
8. LOOKING TO 2026: “Is it your turn?” RI Senate GOP Leader Jessica de la Cruz (R-North Smithfield) asked in an email blast this week. “Although the 2026 election seems like a long way off, it’s just one year away. If you’ve ever thought, “Someone needs to do something about our state,” maybe that someone is you. Reach out — let’s start a conversation. It doesn’t matter if you’ve never served in government. I hadn’t either before I was elected. I remember feeling out of place at first until our legal counsel told me something I’ll never forget: no class can prepare you for elected office — it’s an education in itself. And to the ladies, research shows that most women have to be asked several times before they decide to run, unlike our male counterparts. So don’t count yourself out.”
9. MEDIA I: The good news about the media ecosystem in Rhode Island and Massachusetts is pretty similar, as I reported this week. Despite the disruptive effect of the internet, both states boast a critical mass of reporters and outlets that dig into big stories and look for others. The bad news is that unless you have a good local paper, areas further afield from Providence and Boston tend not to get the day-to-day coverage that used to be more of a constant.
10. MEDIA II: Kudos & congrats to longtime Providence AP stalwart Michelle Smith, who’s taking on a new investigative reporting gig with the Guardian. While you’re at it, give a follow to the latest member of the local AP crew, Kimberlee Kruesi, who contributed to a good read on literary haunts in Providence and Boston.
11. KICKER: The video version of Ben Berke’s story about Rhode Island’s youngest newsroom will put a smile on your face.
